Authors: Shirl Henke
Riley snorted in disgust while Holland obligingly offered blank paper and a pen. In his semiliterate chicken scratching, Big
Red did as Daniels had suggested, eager to get his hands on the boat. Wasn’t Brad Sutton the best on the rivers?
He
damn shittin’ well better be!
Without a trace of condescension, Sutton turned over his down cards. The ace of clubs and ace of hearts. Echoes of “Four of
a kind!” spread through the crowd.
“Four aces! Damn, no wonder he was sure he could beat her!” Teddy Porter crowed triumphantly. “Riley’s done won back his boat!”
But before the noise grew any louder, Delilah calmly flipped over one card. It was the ten of diamonds. The last hole card
was the queen of diamonds. “I believe a straight flush beats four of a kind,” she said gently to Sutton.
“If that don’t beat all,” Porter muttered. “King-high-diamond straight flush. Damned female’s a witch.”
Brad Sutton nodded politely to her. “It most certainly does, ma’am. You are a most skilled and fortunate player.”
“Sutton, yer through in this town!” Riley yelled, leaping to his feet and pounding on the table. “Yer through from St. Paul
to New Orleans, by damn! Time I’m through with you, you’ll be haulin’ shrimp on one of them stinkin’ scows in the Gulf.”
The distinguished-looking gambler gazed at his employer much the same way Delilah had when Riley had neared the table at the
beginning of the evening. With a shrug, he said, “The odds were in my favor. I regret both our losses.” With that he watched
Riley stomp toward the gangplank, where he collided with the gunman he’d sent to collect the deed.
“I think when you disembark, you will find a most unwelcome welcome committee awaiting you on the levee, Mr. Riley,” Horace
Mathers said. “The men whom you employed to wreck the packet on which my companions and I were traveling have confessed everything.
You see, after they left everyone for dead, a handful of survivors followed them into the next town, where they had commenced
to celebrate with Mr. Daniels’s and my niece’s money. They retrieved the additional stake for this game that I was able to
provide.” As an aside for only Delilah and Clint to hear, he whispered, “The whiskey profits alone were sufficient.”
“The police are waiting to arrest you formurder and robbery, Little Runty Riley,” Daniels said with a grin slashing white
on his tanned face. A raucous chorus of laughter followed. The king of the St. Louis levee had just been dethroned.
“Damn, wonder if’n she’ll make ’im strip nekked like she done Daniels,” some wag speculated in a stage whisper.
“Red Riley nekked? Lordy, I hope not! That’d scare half the catfish in the river plum to death. Whooee, ugly!” his companion
responded, eliciting more laughter.
Riley’s face grew redder than his frizzy hair as he hissed orders to his men, then whirled and pulled his gun. They did likewise,
but the winners were prepared. A bullet from Delilah’s Derringer found the place where Riley’s heart supposedly resided. As
he crumpled to the deck amid screams from the terrified crowd, an amazed expression came over his face, then faded to nothingness.
Horace hit the man to his left and Clint the one clutching the deed. Several others of Riley’s men scattered through the crowd
had begun to draw their weapons but quickly reconsidered when their boss and his best guns went down. “I wouldsuggest everyone
remain calm,” Horace announced in a stentorian voice that somehow carried over the cacophony. The assembly began milling around
as onlookers gawked at the dead men and the cool lady gambler who had shot Red Riley.
“I swore I’d make him crawl. I never intended to kill him,” she whispered quietly.
“You had no choice, dear one,” Horace said, wrapping his uninjured arm around her shoulders.
“Everyone all right?” Clint asked Delilah, Horace and Banjo, as the shrill of police whistles drowned out everything. Visually
he noted Deelie’s pallor and mouthed to Horace, “Take her to her cabin. I’ll handle things down here.”
Horace nodded and did as Clint suggested.
“Dang, Boss, thet wuz some shootin’!” Banjo said.
“Clean the money and papers off the table before folks get the idea they can help themselves to our winnin’s,” Clint ordered
his companion while his eyes swept the crowd to see if any of Riley’s supporters might yet cause trouble. No one did. But
Brad Sutton approached Daniels and tipped his hat.
“You, too, are a most skilled and fortunate player, Mr. Daniels. I don’t think I’d care to challenge you with a gun…
though perhaps at a card table?”
Clint shrugged uncertainly. “We’ll see, Mr. Sutton, we’ll see…”
“There, that’s all of it. Your eleven-thousand-dollar stake from the game, in addition to 49 percent of the cargo profits
and passage fees…minus your share of what we owe our creditors, and the pay and bonuses for the captain and crew. It
comes to…” Delilah hesitated, rechecking her figures one final time.
“Forty-three thousand eight hundred, give or take some change,” Clint replied, doing the math quickly in his head.
She looked up abruptly. “Why, yes, that’s within two dollars of my computation. Her eyes narrowed on him. “If you’re so good
with figures, why didn’t you say so when I agreed to take over the clerking?”
“Oh, I’m good with figures, right enough,” he said, grinning as his eyes swept over her crisp white lawn blouse and slim navy
blue skirt, “but we both know you’d never have trusted me to keep the books when we started out. Besides, I had plenty to
do workin’ with the crew, especially after Iversen left us.”
She felt the heat of his gaze and swallowed nervously. They sat in front of the large table in the
Nymph
’s dining room with an obscene amount of cash piled on the table in neat stacks. Overhead the simple brass chandelier cast
a soft glow around the deserted space. Horace and Banjo stood guard at the fore and aft sections of the boat, watching for
intruders, while the partners divided the profits.
Delilah was prepared to take the biggest gamble of her life. She was not certain she could win…but she knew she had
to risk it. Moistening her lips, she said, “I have some plans I’d like you to consider…that is, if you don’t want me
to buy you out so you can return to your saloon? I’m sure Miss St. Clair would be happy to have you back.” She waited with
her heart in her throat.
Like the consummate card player he was, Clint did not give away anything, but shrugged neutrally. “I haven’t rightly decided
what to do about my share of the boat yet…but I don’t intend to go back to the Bud.” Then he smiled, his eyes never
leaving hers. “Why, Deelie, are you jealous of Eva?”
“Certainly not,” she replied coolly. “We had an understanding for the duration of the voyage, which is now over.”
“So it is,” he agreed. Did she move slightly nearer the edge of her seat? For a woman who’d bluffed one of the best players
on the river without turning a hair last night, she sure was off her game now. “What is this
plan
of yours?”
“Well,” she said, inwardly cursing the man who leaned back, his big body draped negligently over the chair across from her,
“my plan involves some rather extensive remodeling of the
Nymph.
We made a decent profit from main-deck passengers this trip. If we refitted the cabins on the upper deck, we could make considerably
more from rich minerswho want to travel home in style.” She waited a beat, but he said nothing, just nodded noncommittally.
Damn you, Clint
Daniels!
“Well, are you interested in continuing our partnership in the Fort Benton trade or not? If so, you’ll have to move off the
boat while the carpenters do their job, as will Uncle Horace and I, of course.”
“Of course,” he echoed. “I reckon while I’m makin’ up my mind about the boat, I’ll take a room in town.”
If that was the way he wanted to play it, so be it! At least he wasn’t going back to Eva St. Clair, a small consolation. Of
course, if he had, she might have had to kill Eva as well as him, she thought savagely. She shoved one large pile of bills
toward him. “Here’s the money for the crewmen. If you’d be so kind as to pay them, I’d be grateful. I’ll pay Luellen, her
helpers and Todd. Oh, and, Clint, I’d like to sell Mr. Kram-mer back his store for the three thousand we owe him, if that’s
all right with you.”
Clint nodded. “Sure is. It’d be a good deal for the old man. He’ll have no Red Riley to worry about ever again. That make
you feel better about what happened last night?” he asked, remembering her deathly pallor after the shootout.
“I’ve had time to consider it…and talk it over with my uncle. If I hadn’t shot Riley, Uncle Horace or you would have,
and then those far more dangerous gunmen might have hit one of you.”
“Good. I knew Horace could talk sense to you,” he said, greatly relieved. “He said you wanted to take Captain Dubois his money.
Give him my best.”
“I hope to convince him to sign on for another voyage next spring. Do you concur?”
“No argument there. He’s the best. Better than Grant Marsh, far as I’m concerned,” he replied, scooping up his share of the
profits in addition to the money to pay the crew. “I’ll have Banjo spread word for the men to come collect their pay.”
He left Delilah sitting at the table, gritting her teeth as she watched him saunter toward the door. “Just don’t get yourthick
skull cracked by riverfront thieves before you pay what we owe,” she said sweetly to his back.
The next morning Delilah and Horace hired a carriage to take them to the Dubois place outside town. As always, their welcome
was warm. Dawn Woman had a lovely luncheon prepared and they enjoyed dining with the couple’s son and daughter, now returned
from a private academy in New Orleans for the summer.
Dubois readily agreed to pilot
The River Nymph
the following spring. “You and Clint are the folks I would choose to work for above any others,” he said, a discreet question
about their partnership left unspoken.
“We have been friends with Clint for many years,” Dawn Woman said as she passed Delilah a slice of fresh peach pie.
It was the opening Delilah had hoped for. “If it isn’t too impertinent…well, I am curious about your friendship with
a former Confederate soldier,” Delilah said, glancing at the Dubois children, Bernadette and Etienne, who looked expectantly
at their father.
“Little pitchers have big ears,” he said with a twinkle. “After they’ve finished their pie, we’ll have coffee outside overlooking
the river. Then I will tell you of my friendship with Clinton Daniels.”
As Dawn Woman poured New Orleans–style coffee laced with hot cream for the four of them at an outdoor table with an incredible
view of the Mississippi below the bluff, the captain began. “As you have probably heard, I served in the Union army during
the late war.”
“Running the Confederate blockade at Vicksburg before Grant opened the Mississippi for the Federals,” Horace supplied. “You
served with some distinction.”
Dubois waved away the praise. “I once told you that Clint and I met upriver while he was living with the Sioux, which is true
…but what I did not tell you was that we knew each other long before that.”
Now he had both Delilah’s and Horace’s attention. “Butyou’re from New Orleans and Clint’s a Missourian,” she said, confused.
“My uncle Clarence owned this property before I inherited it. I spent summers with him during my formative years, which is
how I learned that he was active in the underground railroad, moving runaway slaves across to freedom in Illinois.”
“So, you helped him,” she supplied.
“Yes, I did, although if my father had ever found out about it, he would’ve caned me within an inch of my life for taking
such risks,” Dubois said with a soft smile. “One of the people he worked with in this dangerous endeavor was a widow named
Dorcas Niemeier. She was childless but had taken in her ne’er-do-well brother’s young son after his mother died.”
“Clint,” Delilah said.
“Yes. She was a kind and loving soul and raised him well—until the raiders came. They killed her and then looted and burned
her deceased husband’s lovely home while Clint was away.”
Now Delilah was more confused than ever. “Southern slavers?” she asked. It made no sense.
Dubois shook his head. “No, they were just plain thieves, cutthroats taking advantage of the unrest in a slave state that
did not secede. They called themselves Union sympathizers, claiming they were after Southerners guilty of treason.” His expression
hardened. “That was only an excuse to steal and kill.”
“And Clint’s natural reaction was to fight against these men,” Horace said.
“Since coming to Missouri, you have perhaps heard of Colonel John Singleton Mosby?” Jacques asked.
Horace nodded. “Called ‘the Gray Ghost,’ a Confederate guerilla fighter.”
“Just so. He had men recruiting along the Missouri River the day Clint returned and found his aunt dead and the Niemeier family
farm destroyed. Everyone knew the offal who had done it, that they were Northerners.”
“Murderous brigands of any geographic designation remain yet thieves and killers,” Horace said.
“But a grief-stricken young man saw only what had been done to a woman he loved. It must have been an unbearable loss. He
spent a year with Mosby before being captured and sent to a prison in Alton.”
“We know the rest of the story,” Delilah said quietly.
My
mother died when I was just a tadpole and my father was the town
drunk.
He had lost his mother, his aunt, his wife and unborn child. Every woman he had ever loved…
Do you love me enough to risk happiness one more time, Clint?
The
following day the workmen arrived at the
Nymph
, and Delilah gave them instructions about the special remodeling project they were to do. Clint had already removed his possessions
from his cabin and taken a hotel room in town. She and Horace took rooms in a slightly less lavish establishment a few blocks
away. Although she traveled to and from the boat daily to oversee progress, she never encountered Clint.
He kept his distance. But she did notice that Banjo Banks, his eyes and ears on the levee, hung around, doubtless reporting
back to him that carpenters were tearing out walls and doing extensive work on the second deck. However, the exact nature
of that work remained a secret. She had promised a substantial bonus to Ed Taubmann and his men for keeping mum.
The second half of the summer grew even more sultry and warm…and seemed endless to Clint. He played cards and bet on
horse races to keep boredom at bay. Mostly he won, even though he did not really care. After all, he was a rich man and the
money he had invested yielded sufficient income for him to retire comfortably.
He damned himself a coward for avoiding Delilah. And for not being able to break things off cleanly by selling his share of
the
Nymph
to her and leaving the city. She had not pressed him about the matter and he felt gut certain she wanted him to retain his
ownership…and more. But he was damned if he knew whether he dared to make that commitment.
One evening early in August, as he sat in the Planter’s House bar nursing a bourbon garnished with mint leaves andice, Horace
Mathers’s tall, cadaverous figure approached his table. “Howdy, Horace. Glad to see your arm’s out of the splint. It heal
all right?” he asked.
“Well enough to soundly thrash you, if I thought it would do any good,” the older man said dryly, pulling up a chair uninvited.
Daniels laughed mirthlessly. “Yeah, I’m the proverbial horse led to water. How’s Deelie?”
“Quite busy, as I’m certain you’ve been informed by Mr. Banks. My niece is unaware I am here. I trust that will not change
after I have spoken with you.”
Clint nodded. “You want to know if I’m goin’ to sell my share of the boat.”
“Of far greater significance is whether you intend to remain in her life. The business arrangements are quite beside the point.”
He paused, his eyes drilling Daniels’s face before he resumed. “I will speak bluntly. Delilah is in love with you…and
you, I believe, are in love with her. The question is, what do you intend to do about it?”
Clint tossed down the rest of his drink and motioned the waiter for a refill. “Damned if I know what to do. Hell, Horace,
she’s a rich woman, a beautiful, intelligent, good-hearted rich woman. She can do better than me.”
“To very loosely paraphrase the Bard, methinks the gentleman doth protest too much. My niece is indeed wealthy, intellectually
keen, attractive and generous. She is also headstrong, hot-tempered, stubborn and, above all, exceedingly devious.”
Clint didn’t like the direction in which this conversation was going. When the waiter placed the refill in front of him, he
interrupted Horace to ask, “You want a drink? I sure need this. It’s on my bill.”
“Ah, generous of you, my boy. A trait you have in common with my niece. Yes, I will imbibe whatever alcoholic libation my
friend is enjoying,” he said to the waiter, who looked blankly at Clint.
Daniels waved his hand. “He says he’ll have one of these,” he translated, pointing to his glass. After the waiter scurried
away to fetch the drink, Clint asked, “All right. What has our devious little schemer done to bring you to me?”
“As I said, Delilah knows nothing of my being here…”
“But?” Clint prompted, fortified by another swallow of minty bourbon.
“This afternoon she paid a visit to Miss St. Clair at the Blasted Bud.”
Clint nearly spit out the mouthful of bourbon. Choking it down, he sputtered, “She went to face off against Eva! Damn, they’ll
kill each other!” He jumped up, nearly overturning his chair before Horace placed his hand on Clint’s arm.
“No blood was spilled, I assure you. Delilah returned to our suite at the Marsden quite unscathed.”
“Why in tarnation would she visit Eva? I haven’t…that is, well, damn, let’s just say we haven’t been ‘partners’ since
I bought into the
Nymph.
She and Justus own the Bud now. I have nothin’ to do with it.”
Horace allowed his austere face a rare beautific grin. “I know. But until this afternoon, my niece did not.”
Clint combed his fingers through his hair and sighed. “Eva and I had it out when I made the offer to sell my interest in the
place. She told me either to stop drinkin’, start wearin’ a bib…or marry your niece.”
“Capital advice if ever I’ve heard any,” Horace said, sipping the drink the waiter placed before him. “Captain Dubois has
agreed to take the
Nymph
upriver again in the spring. With Riley gone, men are clamoring to join the crew. Profits should be better than ever.”
“You’re assuming I’m stayin’ aboard,” Clint said, irritation in his voice.
Horace finished his drink and rose magisterially above the seated gambler. “Yes, I am. As I said, Delilah is stubborn to a
fault and quite single-minded. She wants you. Be warned: She shall have you. Good evening, Clint.”
Daniels sat and fumed for another hour, drinking more than he knew he should, remembering his last conversationwith Eva. She
hadn’t actually couched matters in the terms he’d related to Horace. In fact, she had at first been incredulous, then angry,
then resigned when he’d offered to sell the Bud to her and Justus Brummell. He could still hear her parting words to him:
“I knew from the minute she walked into our place that she’d be nothing but trouble, baby. Still, I hoped you wouldn’t fall
for her. Now that you’ve gone and done it, you might as well make it legal.” Justus had seconded the idea, the traitor!
He was sick and tired of everyone giving him unsolicited advice—the
same
unsolicited advice. Even Banjo had played pear-shaped Cupid a week earlier when he’d made his report on the remodeling. “Boss,
yew gotta see her givin’ them men whut fer ’bout how they’s doin’ their jobs. One hell of a woman yew got there. Don’t go
do nothin’ dumb like lettin’ ’er git away.”
“If one more person says I ought to marry Deelie, I’ll shoot him,” he muttered as the ever-patient waiter hesitantly approached,
bearing a note. The moment he handed it over and hurried away, Clint recognized the soft fragrance of roses.
It was from Deelie, dammit!
Delilah looked around the spacious room, still aromatic from freshly cut lumber and newly purchased furnishings. She ran her
hand over the rich, dark green brocade upholstery on one of the chairs and admired the gleaming polished mahogany of the table.
She’d had Luellen make up a cold feast of fried chicken, fresh garden vegetables in vinaigrette, deviled eggs and a lush peach
cobbler. A bottle of fine French champagne lay buried up to its neck in a sterling bucket filled with ice.
It was time to celebrate her project’s completion. But would Clint accept her invitation? And her dare…? “Well, I can
always drink the whole blasted bottle if he doesn’t,” she whispered, walking nervously over to the freestanding oval mirror
in the corner and inspecting herself once again.
Then she heard footsteps coming down the deck…andrecognized the soft, graceful way Clint walked. “This is it. Let the
game begin,” she whispered to herself as she walked to the door and opened it.
Clint stood dumbfounded, not only by Deelie, but by the space behind her. She wore a silk cloak that swathed her from her
neck to the floor, revealing nothing of her lush body. But the room was unrecognizable, no longer a cramped little sitting
area. Now the back three cabins had been converted into one generous room, complete with upholstered chairs, a settee and
a dining table groaning with a lavish spread of food. At the opposite end, two cane-backed chairs were placed across from
a smaller table. It was covered in green baize. A deck of cards served as centerpiece.
“You fixin’ on having a card game, Deelie?” he asked, breathing in her rose fragrance. Lordy, she smelled good enough to eat;
forget the aromas of Luellen’s fine cooking!
She reached out and pulled him inside by the lapel of his jacket, closing the door behind them. “We’re going to play poker.
And this time you won’t palm any cards.”
“I didn’t bring much cash,” he said with a smirk. “You intend to win my share of the boat?”
“I’m not interested in that. What I had in mind was playing for…articles of clothing.”
“Like that cut of cards when you stripped me buck-arse naked?” he asked.
“Not quite. We’ll both gamble using our garments as currency,” she replied, allowing the rusty red silk cloak to fall open
just enough so he could catch a glimpse of the delights beneath it. Then she closed it again. If she hadn’t seen the way his
Adam’s apple bobbed in his throat and his eyes widened, she might not have had the courage to proceed. “Showdown poker. Seven
cards dealt up for each of us,” she added in the coolest voice she could muster.
“Last man—or woman—still wearin’ anything wins?” he asked, his mouth gone dry. Suddenly he was dead sober in spite of what
he’d drunk earlier in the evening. Damn, Horace had warned him she’d stop at nothing! When she nodded, fingering the drawstrings
to her cloak, he nearly choked. “Once one of us wins, then what?”
“I haven’t finished laying out the house rules.” She moistened her lips before continuing. “If I win, you stay in partnership
with me on the
Nymph.
If you win…it’s your choice. You can bow out and I’ll buy your share. Or…you can stay and live like this.” She
took his hand in hers and walked over to the table, gesturing to the food and iced bucket of champagne. “First we feast.”
“First?” he croaked.
“Then…” she murmured, opening the door at the back of the room to reveal a bedroom almost as large as the living quarters—with
a huge bed front and center. A few candles flickered enticingly from side tables and a second bottle of champagne, also chilling
in an ice bucket, sat within easy reach. “My offer’s pretty obvious. Do you have any more questions?”
“Do we have to eat Luellen’s food first?” he asked, knowing what her offer really entailed.
A teasing grin moved from her eyes to her lips. “We’ll do things in any order you wish…if you win.”
He knew her game—and it wasn’t cards or a sybaritic delight just for tonight. It was spending the rest of their lives on this
boat as husband and wife. Clint felt a sudden urge to give in to the inevitable. “You’re just plannin’ to get me naked again,”
he said with an arrogant grin of his own.
“I’ve always liked what I saw when you were.” She could not believe how brazen she’d become. How brazen he’d made her, as
her eyes swept from his thick straw-colored hair slowly down to his polished black boots, pausing to admire every inch of
his long, tall body on the way.
“Hell, Deelie, let’s play poker.”
They took their seats and she picked up the deck. “Cut the cards to see who deals first,” she said, all business now.
She shuffled, then shoved the deck to him for a cut. He drew a king of hearts. “Kinda appropriate,” he said, watchingas she
took her turn. She drew a queen of diamonds. “Must be your lucky card.”
“Your deal.” She leaned back so the heavy silk draped the soft curves beneath, pleased when the cards nearly exploded in his
hands as he shuffled. But he quickly recovered and they got down to the business at hand. By the end of the deal, he had won
with two pair, kings and deuces. Delilah had only a single pair of sevens. “Where should I begin?” she asked herself.
She raised a slippered foot, turning the slender ankle enticingly while her fingers toyed with the tie to her cloak. He considered,
rubbing his jaw as he eyed the ankle, then moved higher to her throat. “The cloak?”
“Why not?” She pulled the bow and it slithered loose, allowing the heavy silk to pool around her chair. Beneath it, a rusty
red peignoir made of some kind of translucent lacy material revealed several layers yet to be stripped away while enticing
his eyes to look through the outer robe to the low-cut chemise and slim skirt beneath it. The color caught the reddish highlights
in her rich chestnut hair, burnishing it to living flames dancing in the soft lantern light.
Delilah was delighted to have lost the first deal. This would really upset his concentration. She could see him move uncomfortably,
his lower body in obvious distress. Perhaps it would help if he lost his breeches…She won the second hand on the last
of her seven face-up cards, a four to complete an eight-high straight. Since there was no way to get to his ever-tightening
pants without first removing his boots, she suggested, “A boot?”
“So I can limp up the cobblestones barefoot?” he asked in a mocking drawl, but he raised his leg.
“We’ll see. Let me be your valet?” she asked in a husky voice, and swished provocatively over to his side of the table. She
straddled his outstretched leg and tugged off the boot, tossing it in a corner. She knew she was giving him an irresistible
view of her derrière and couldn’t resist wriggling it just the tiniest little bit.
The cards fell good and ill, back and forth between them as the candles burned lower. But one thing was growing increasingly
clear: In spite of her outer calm, Delilah was losing at a slightly swifter rate than Clint. “Are you dealing yourself face
cards?” she asked breathlessly as he peeled down her second stocking and tossed it over his shoulder. It floated to the pile
where its mate and both rust silk slippers lay.
He raised his hands. “No jacket sleeves left. Shirt’s too tight. Where in hell would I be hidin’ cards? In my armpits?” He’d
lost his jacket and other boot earlier.
She had worn a ruby necklace, earrings and a bracelet, all bargaining chips to prolong the game…and the torture. But
the gems winked from the discarded clothing in the corner. So did Clint’s gold cigar case.